Everything is politics

To newspaper opinion writers, anyway. (Who to a large degree wouldn’t know an “average American” from a fire plug.)

Hallmark movies -- a Red State idea, not to be exported to Blue States.

“(S)erving the Trump voter is turning out to be a big winner, as Crown Media’s family networks, the Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies & Mysteries, have proved. Amid declining viewership and revenue at many TV networks, the Hallmark channels are on a roll.

“In 2016, viewership for the Hallmark Channel was up 36%, while the Movies & Mysteries channel notched a 46% gain. The momentum continued into 2017, with a big payoff coming during November and December, when both networks show wall-to-wall Christmas movies, including dozens of new productions and favorites from the Hallmark archives. In mid-November 2017, the Hallmark Channel was the third most-watched network on cable television, averaging more than 2 million viewers per day. Only ESPN and Fox News did better.”

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-malanga-hallmark-success-20180109-story.html#ampshare=http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-malanga-hallmark-success-20180109-story.html

What is Hallmark’s secret?

Movies and Mysteries does not depend on gore and violence to hold an audience. Romantic movies “have happy endings.” Or, as the LA Times writer admits, programs “that once defined mainstream television.”

Hollywood has a warped sense of America. We are not sex-crazed, nor drug addicts drugs. We treat people nice because it’s the right thing to do. We don’t look for payback when doing a good deed. And, we do good deeds.

Hollywood works on power, drugs and sex. Hollywood would not exist were it not for people who abuse power, who see people as a sexual necessity. Hollywood props up much of the illegal and legal drug industries.

Hollywood could learn lessons of financial success from Hallmark. But, as the LA Times writer notes, Hollywood prefers and promotes “dark shows,” such as “American Horror Story,” “True Blood” and “The Walking Dead.”

Those shows reflect the way Hollywood sees the rest of America, when, in fact, those shows are reflective of the Hollywood establishment.